


Zuzuhakte

by Kaslyna



Category: Defiance (TV)
Genre: Gen, Grief, Healing, Mourning, New Beginnings, Physical Therapy, Post S3, Starting Over
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 08:46:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5702311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaslyna/pseuds/Kaslyna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’d lost Kenya and survived. She’d fallen down a dark path, yes, but then again, no other loss in Amanda’s life could ever truly hurt her as much as Kenya’s had. She would survive these new losses, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Zuzuhakte

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a collection of works in various fandoms based on prompts from YeahWrite's 52 Prompt Challenge. This prompt was "starting again", so I decided to explore Amanda's mindset post Season 3. All canon pairings, friendships, etc. are fair game, because I didn't really want to focus on one pairing for this fic. Title of the fic is the Irathient word for survivor, zuzuhakte.

Amanda Rosewater is a woman of movement, of action. She is not a woman who sits and waits easily; and yet, this is exactly what physical therapy requires of her, she finds. The wound in her stomach is two weeks old now, but it still feels just as raw as when it had first happened after an intense round of muscle strengthening exercises. She’s pretty immobile, Samir’s orders, but he still demands an hour a day of these exercises. He says without starting small in physical therapy, Amanda’s healing will be delayed, and Amanda has begrudgingly cooperated.

 

It helps, she supposes, that Bailey is doing a pretty good job at running the town while Amanda’s out of commission. But it’s still not an easy task, and even harder than doing the actual exercises is admitting that she needs them. The wound is healing well, she’s on track to a full recovery, and if she’s lucky she’ll be out of here within the next two weeks; but the thought of being alone terrifies her, especially when she’s so weak she cannot even stand without the support of others. Amanda hates her immobility and prays to whatever gods may or may not be out there that she heals fast.

 

When she’s not doing various strengthening exercises that leave her stomach a blaze of fire, Amanda often has visitors. Berlin makes it a habit to stop by in the morning for a good hour or two, and she knows better than to refuse to tell Amanda anything about the town’s going ons (Bailey means well, Amanda knows this, but it doesn’t stop her deflections from frustrating the hell out of her). Irisa comes in the afternoon or early evenings, sitting with Amanda in more quiet than Berlin but it’s a peaceful kind of quiet, and Amanda finds she likes that about Irisa; the young woman doesn’t talk much, but when she does, it’s guaranteed to be something worth hearing.

 

Sometimes, Stahma Tarr shows up. That’s an awkward silence, filled with tension; the only good news she gleams from her as the Casti woman cleans and checks her wounds is that she and Datak have managed to regain control of most of their former criminal empire. As the saying goes, it’s better the devil you know, and Amanda can admit as selfish and often cruel as the Tarrs can be, she’d sooner deal with them than the handful of loose cannons that came into play after they had left town, who had no idea of organization and no desire to attempt subtlety. Even rarer than Stahma’s visits, though, are Alak’s. He stops by perhaps once a week with his son, Luke, and Amanda likes those. Like Irisa, he doesn’t talk much; but playing with the baby helps Amanda to realize that maybe everything in this world isn’t broken.

 

The absences are harder to deal with than the visitors. Instead of Doc Yewll fussing over her wound and making sexual innuendo out of nothing, sarcasm flowing freely, it’s Samir, awkward and young and more than a little naive. He tries, she knows he does, but it doesn’t make Yewll’s absence hurt any less. And then there’s Nolan. Nolan, who Irisa says forced her back to Earth before he took control of the Omec ship to take them into space and find a new home for them. That absence cuts deep, too. Amanda wants to believe he’ll come back, but she’s also certain that there’s no realistic way for that to happen; not when he’s in outer space. Even some distances cannot be breached. Yewll’s on that ship, too, and it’s even more unlikely she’ll return; Irisa had told her that interfacing with the ship was killing her.

 

“He’ll be back,” Irisa had said, smiling wistfully, “They both will. I don’t think there’s anything that would make Nolan not return for me. And Defiance now, too.”

 

Amanda had swallowed and forced her voice to be steady as she’d replied, “I wish I could believe that. But he won’t come back in my lifetime if he does somehow manage it, so he’s as good as dead to me.”

 

Irisa had looked at her in mild disapproval, but she had nodded and said nothing more on the subject. That had been a week and a half ago; the first three days of recovery had been a haze, and she’d been in no condition to hear that kind of news. When Irisa had briefed her, Amanda had only been slightly better off, but it didn’t make her sentiment any less true. She wouldn’t dwell on Yewll and Nolan; if they ever managed to come back, she’d be long dead, and it was easier to declare them both dead. It’d hurt her less, anyways, than pining over two people who she’d never see again anyways.

 

She’d lost Kenya and survived. She’d fallen down a dark path, yes, but then again, no other loss in Amanda’s life could ever truly hurt her as much as Kenya’s had. She would survive these new losses, too. So Amanda had been briefed by Bailey about the state of the town, declared Irisa the new Lawkeeper, and done her best to focus on her recovery.

 

Which brought her back to the present, alone and hurting after therapy, no visitors to be seen and too much space in her head to occupy with thoughts of these losses. Her mother, Kenya, Treasure Doll, Rafe, Nolan, Yewll-and of course, Stahma and Pottinger’s respective betrayals-it was all too much when she was alone like this. Amanda was almost glad for the pain from her abdomen; without it, she’d have nothing to ground her, nothing to keep her from losing herself to the grief of too many losses in her life.

 

The door opened, as Amanda debated asking Samir for pain medicine or not, and she turned her head a little to see Irisa as she entered the doctor’s office. The young Irathient came slowly, and she sat on the bed next to Amanda’s, now unoccupied by it’s previous tenant. Amanda tried to give her a small smile, but even she could feel how weak it must look.

 

“I can ask Samir for pain medicine, if you don’t want to have to yell,” Irisa suggested quietly.

 

“Yes,” Amanda nodded slowly. Irisa nodded, too, and then stood to go get the young human doctor.

 

The medicine was given, and Amanda knew it’d be moments before it kicked in; intravenous pain medications were a thing of true beauty. Amanda whispered a thank you to them both, and Samir left. Irisa watched her quietly for a bit, and then she took out her knives to begin sharpening them.

 

“Irisa,” Amanda murmured.

 

Irisa looked at her, the only acknowledgment she’d heard that Amanda would get, and so Amanda continued, words beginning to slur slightly as the medicine worked its way through her veins, “It’s not that I don’t want to believe that he’s coming back. I do. I want to believe he’s coming back with every fiber of my being. But I can’t, Irisa. I’ve lost everyone I care about, and most of them, I didn’t know if they were dead or alive, and I hoped. I hoped so hard, and yet, so many turned out dead. All I’ve got left is this town, and I cannot afford to hurt myself again hoping when I could be making sure that this town is still on the map for a good, long time.”

 

There was a long pause, though not an awkward one, as Irisa absorbed her words. Then she nodded, slowly, and came to stand beside Amanda. The younger woman took Amanda’s hand into her own, hesitant and awkward, as unsure about contact as Amanda was; Amanda smiled faintly at the similarity. Then Irisa looked her in the eye, serious, as she promised, “You haven’t lost everyone yet.”

 

Amanda couldn’t blink back the tears anymore, so she didn’t even try. Irisa squeezed her hand gently before releasing her to allow her some semblance of privacy to collect herself, sitting once again on the other bed as she took out her journal and began to draw. Amanda struggled to get it together, but once she did, she released a shaky exhale and looked at the young Irathient, quietly and unobtrusively standing guard over her, making sure she wasn’t alone. And Amanda thought of Berlin, hell, even of Stahma and Alak, and of course, Bailey too, and she knew that Irisa was right.

  
Amanda may have lost a lot of people, but she was strong, a survivor, and she hadn’t lost everyone and everything yet. And so, she’d do her best to start over again, the way she’d always done.


End file.
